


After Effect

by Nevara_Alyss



Category: Mass Effect
Genre: Alternate Ending, Destroy Ending, F/M, Post-Ending, Sexual Content, Sole Survivor (Mass Effect), Spacer (Mass Effect), Strong Language, Violence
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-07-15
Updated: 2013-07-15
Packaged: 2017-12-20 07:50:21
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,333
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/884796
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Nevara_Alyss/pseuds/Nevara_Alyss
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After suffering grave injuries in the battle for Earth, Shepard deals with the inevitable and denies the possibilities. What will she find when she does? On a mission to find who is killing ex-Cerberus scientists, Shepard faces her demons when she and a man she thought was dead cross paths. Can she endure the turmoil of the numerous confrontations she will be faced with when her only ally is a man who was once a friend and now an enemy?</p>
            </blockquote>





	After Effect

**Author's Note:**

> I still don't like the endings with the EC so with the Citadel DLC I broke it up and gave myself a happier ending. I retconned the consequences of the Destroy Ending for story continuity, but am now more content with the game as a whole.
> 
> The story will happen sporadically, but will happen. I like how it's playing out in my head now.

A choking gasp of breath filled Adryan's lungs. The stinging sensation as they expanded to take in the volatile air around her shot her up in a convulsive fit of coughing and gagging. Blood soaked sputum splashed on broken remains of cement and muddied earth. Slow trickles of red ran down the splintered ground into a small pool at her feet. Burnt flesh and still smoldering fires permeated the air with its undeniable aromas.

Adryan wiped her mouth with a shaky hand and tried to stand under her own power. The sound of voices in the distance made her will to move stronger now. They grew closer as she took another staggered breath and winced in agony as she pushed herself up. Her head spun along with the ground beneath her as she straightened up and took her first cautious step.

Searing pain shot through her abdomen and nearly brought her to the ground. She lurched forward, her hands clutching the source of the pain. Slowly, her black eyes fell to her guarded torso. She pulled her hand away and saw the vibrant sanguine clashing violently against her scorched palm. The large wound stood gaping in the overcast sunlight. She grimaced at the damage and pressed her hand into it again.

"Damn it," she groaned as she lurched forward.

Her thoughts wandered along with her in hauntingly blurred gaps. She couldn't remember how she had gotten to where she laid or if she had finished her mission, but from the calls of soldiers in front of her she figured something catastrophic had happened. Their tones were ominous as they called out names of people. Yet, the one thing she didn't hear was the sound of gunfire that rattled the sky with its undeniable cadence.

She lifted her hand as she walked through the fog of smoke. It didn't matter, the burning of her eyes made her vision blurry as she meandered among the ruins in a daze. The slow tick of her medi-gel being released made her jump. Limping forward, her legs began to give out before she wanted them to. She growled in anger as she forced herself to continue.

Bodies in contorted positions dotted the near vacant street. Some were torn completely apart, the only thing it could have been was the nearby corpse of the brute that was feet away. Its pungent aroma overrode the smell of boiled blood and cooked meat in ways that made her senses seem unbearable. She didn't see anyone she knew as she examined them briefly. Piles of bodies of differing races littered the ground in haphazard heaps.

She shook her head at the nightmare inducing sight and forged headlong into a familiar location. Her memory flashed to the hours before. The giant metallic corpse of the reaper siege weapon had crushed several buildings under its weight. She stopped briefly and rubbed the agonizing pain from her thigh feverishly. It worsened as her hand swept across it; however she wouldn't acknowledge the truth of it. Her mind explained it in full detail.

The left flank had been completely decimated by Reaper forces. Many fell in the battle as was proof of the mangled bodies riddled with bullet holes and numerous heat sinks were cast on the ground from the squad's fire fight. Banshees were overrunning them as they await the arrival of the hulking steel beast to arrive. Her squad was strong till the end. Squad. Her squad. She was so proud of them in their moments of danger and feared for them in the same breath. It was in those final moments she had thrown Vakarian down to the ground as a marauder opened fire from the right. Even though she had taken a ricocheted round to her thigh, she didn't let on to anyone that she had been injured. She didn't want them to worry about her. Their heads needed to be in the game.

Her heart picked up as she tried to find some small clue as to where they were. She hadn't thought about it till that moment how very alone she was. Anderson was nowhere in sight. There was nothing. As if they had vanished as soon as they had gotten to the beam.

"Garrus? Javik?" she yelped. Her voice was hoarse and pained her throat as if she'd swallowed glass shards. The force was enough to send her reeling into another fit of coughs, followed by more blood being emitted from her wounds. "Fuck!" she belted in agony and leaned against a building till the pain ebbed again.

She caught her breath, but the dizziness grew in intensity. Blood loss, shock, the punishment her body had been under just a few hours before was taking its toll. It would only be a matter of time before the adrenaline would wear off and she would be in a far worse state of grave danger than her life had teetered on in her previous bouts with death.

Suck it up, she thought as she heaved her tiring weight off the brick wall and continued forward.

Every few feet became a new challenge for her. In the multitudes of fire fights and the rain that had poured down on them in the dead of night, the familiar battlegrounds had become new and unforgiving on her bearings. Store fronts that had given them a brief respite from cover fire were no longer reliable landmarks. Her eyes burned with tears of frustration as she hobbled down a ladder and walked through the parking garage where the brutes were dead.

She remembered this place from the evening before. It was the awkward silence that drove home the point again. Something had happened in the hours of her unconsciousness and the sickening realization sank into her gut. No one had come looking for her. And if no one had, were they even still alive? The thought of dread made her pace quicken to a near jog. Injuries be damned, she was going to find out what happened.

Walking back into daylight, she hurried along the torn up avenue to where they had started the final assault. The nearly decimated building loomed over her, but there was no sound from within. Her heart sank at the notion that there were no survivors in the FOB. Many of the Makos were burned out shells. Charred bodies hung out doors as if people had tried to escape a massive explosion. The once important barricade had fallen exposing the inner workings of her final hours.

Adryan slid a sheet of metal out of the way and maneuvered her broken body through the small opening. The boulevard was empty in all directions. She stood in the intersection to let the anger of her calf become a sheered pain that grew worse the more she put weight on it. It had to be broken at that point. She frowned at the prospect of such an injury and the fact that she hadn't heard the medi-gel being dispensed any longer made her fears all the more visceral.

She tried to use her omni-tool to no avail. It flickered until death before giving her any information on her status. She was defeated in an instant by it. Everything had become a clusterfuck so immeasurably fast that her only options were to give up or press on and take the risk of running into more trouble in the immediate future. Anderson would have wanted to force herself on as well as Garrus. Hell, if it had been anyone else she would have forced them to continue forward. There was no quitting. Not when she had worked so hard to get to where she was now.

"What are the final reports stating?" she heard Major Coats question.

She squinted in the direction of his voice and began following it. Her quickness to find him or anyone was rewarded with more pain and an increased trail of blood behind her. The fog had become the thickest but saw the shadowy movement just beyond. She wanted to know what had happened in the aftermath of the war as much as anyone else.

She opened her mouth to speak but couldn't under the parched conditions. She groaned harshly and picked up the pace. Her hopes were riding on everything that had come before. Promises made that she refused to break on account that it was her future she had fought for. Mordin had been right. You couldn't anthropomorphize the galaxy. She fought for herself, her crew, her lover, the unborn children that none of them would have if they failed. Even with the odds totally against them she had the will to face down her demons with every fiber of her being. It was what she was meant to do. Not just as a leader but as a person who through all her faults found solace in the fact that either by death or completion of her mission she would have endured.

The hardships witnessed were on a scale that seemed insurmountable to the person who couldn't cope with the emotional backlash it would have created. Each problem seemed to cascade out of control by the end and she was feeling the effects of it as anyone else would have. It was only natural to show that even if you had to lie to yourself to see a hopeful return until you believed it doesn't mean that eventually those that knew you aren't going to realize that you are burning your final bridges to distance yourself from the possibility of the inevitable.

She closed her eyes, letting her head fall back and let it sink in that she had been lying for the sake of morale – more to herself than to the crew. Everyone knew that this was likely a one way trip, but so was the suicide mission or the flight to Ilos. This should have been no different.

"What the hell happened?" she asked out loud. "How come I can't remember where everything went wrong?"

"Commander?" a familiar voice called to her.

Slowly, her head came back to center and opened her eyes to see someone coming towards her. His sooty face beamed with a grin as he approached. The closer he came the sooner it dwindled into a look of horror. His eyes were large and grew wet as he stopped. Several other bodies joined the fold.

"Steve?" she murmured.

Energy coursed through her. The overwhelming urge to move forced her to run towards him. Her broken body shambled quickly along with the hitched sobs she was trying to hold back. Just before she got to him her leg gave way with a solid snap of her remaining bone. She stumbled forward into his arms. For the briefest of moments she thought she heard herself laughing as the new dose of adrenaline flood her blood stream.

"Shepard?" Jacob spoke up, his arm hung in a sling.

"I'm alright," she muttered.

"Bullshit, Shepard! What the hell are you trying to do? Get yourself killed?" Jack snapped angrily.

Adryan knew it was her way of protecting herself. Her eyes spoke the truth. Everyone was worried. In all honestly, she had no idea how bad her injuries were, nor did she care at the moment. She coughed again and grumbled as she hocked the phlegmy liquid on to the street. The sweet taste of blood coated her tongue and as her vision became hazy, she glanced at Steve. She could feel the hot liquid pooling in the back of her throat.

"The – the Normandy," she choked out. "What happened to the Normandy?"

The group looked at each other and then at the Commander who was now beginning to slink to the ground. Cortez led her down as gently as he could and held her. She began to shake violently. The air grew cold around her and she gasped. She lifted her hand away from the wound in her side and stared at it briefly. A faint smile crept across her face. She was accepting her fate. So much trauma. Not enough time to get medical attention. All the thoughts she could muster in the matter of a few slowing heartbeats.

"We don't know, Commander," Steve replied. Adryan's eyes began to close as she felt the ending drawing nearer. A sharp jostle shook her awake. "Don't you die on us, Shepard." His voice was becoming shriller as he fought to keep her awake.

"Shhh. It's okay, Steve," she assured him softly. "Just find them."

He pressed his hand into her wound and looked up at Jacob and Jack. She didn't feel anything anymore. No emotions, or guilt, or pain. Everything washed away as she began to bleed out in his arms. She cracked a smirk at the notion that maybe her luck had run out. It was only a matter of time, she knew it. Borrowed time was all she had ever been given and she had been given a lot. It gave her the ability to experience things she didn't think was possible for her. She loved and was loved in return and in her final moments the idea still terrified her. After Akuze she didn't think it would be possible and she wouldn't allow for it. Too much of a liability but she was thankful she was given the chance to experience it again.

"Fight damn it!" Steve yelped as her eyes closed for the final time. "You'll find them. Hold on to that!" He shook her again, but with his voice fading into the darkness that had been so familiar and so alien, she knew that the fight was finally over and her labors had come to fruition. "Get the goddamn medic! Medic! No! No! No! We need you. He needs you! I need you!"

I'm sorry. I'm proud of you. It was her final thought before falling into the abyss. She wanted to live, but after everything, she didn't think it was possible to continue.

Good-bye.


End file.
